Funding the Future: The Dutch Foundation’s Investment in the European Heritage Tribune’s Sustainable Growth

In an important advancement, the European Heritage Tribune (EHT) has been granted a research budget by the Dutch HeritageLab Foundation. This funding is earmarked for bolstering the organisational infrastructure of the Tribune, and putting in place a more sustainable financial foothold. Established to meet a crucial need for knowledge dissemination within the European Heritage sector, the Heritage Tribune is now set to solidify its foundational base.

ErfgoedLab, a Dutch foundation, stands as an incubator for ideas and initiatives that resonate nationally. This ‘laboratory’ is the driving force behind novel projects in the heritage sector, ensuring they are firmly rooted and self-sustaining.

Incubating Tech for Heritage
The foundation’s past endeavors include a nationwide QR project, ‘More About This’ promoting the use of QR tags on buildings, locations, and events under a single national brand. Another intriguing and innovative initiative is the ‘Monumentenmonitor’ (‘Monuments Monitor’), an online dashboard providing up-to-date data on all green and build monuments in a province or municipality. It offers current 3D images, information about an object’s function, its maintenance status, energy consumption, and vulnerability concerning climate change. Many Dutch provinces now utilize this monitor’s data to shape their policies.

News Services
ErfgoedLab was established 15 years ago to foster a news service akin to the Heritage Tribune in the Netherlands, named ‘De Erfgoedstem’ (‘The Voice of Heritage’). This service remains highly successful, distributing all media news about cultural heritage, maintaining a big subscription base, and being supported by sponsorships from approximately 35 organizations within the Dutch heritage field.

European Perspective
A decade later, in 2018, Erfgoedlab facilitated the launch of the European Heritage Tribune (EHT). As the European perspective became increasingly significant for cultural heritage, it was clear that a European version of the successful Dutch ‘Erfgoedstem’ would be beneficial. The EHT was designed to address the need for better knowledge dissemination within the European Heritage Sector, boost a sense of unity, and provide a platform for agenda-setting and discussion. The initiative for a pilot was supported by donations and contributions from the Dutch Government, provinces, heritage organizations, and private companies, with ErfgoedLab playing a crucial, connecting role.

Research budget
Now, ErfgoedLab is poised to enable the next vital step: establishing a more robust presence for the Heritage Tribune within the European Heritage sector. Despite a successful growth trajectory driven by a handful of dedicated editors and a modest budget, the aim is to further embed EHT, and amplify its impact and activities. To that end, the Heritage Tribune has now been granted a research budget. A significant move for the Tribune, it heralds a new chapter in the ongoing narrative of heritage preservation and awareness.

If you share our dedication to heritage and wish to aid the Heritage Tribune in its mission to disseminate knowledge about heritage and the cultural heritage industry, we warmly invite you to come forward and contribute to this worthy cause.

This article was originally published in English. Texts in other languages are AI-translated. To change language: go to the main menu above.

Doneren